“No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.”
Reid Hoffman, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of LinkedIn, says this while touching on the importance of collaboration.
Collaboration is necessary, especially when you’re working on a distributed team. When all your teammates are in remote locations, it’s hard to share ideas. This kind of working setup makes it challenging to quickly communicate or adapt to teammates’ immediate reactions.
Accountability can be difficult, and documenting everything becomes a need rather than a luxury. Collaboration apps help teams in such situations, keeping them aligned with the vision and company culture you have set together.
However, as these solutions gained popularity, teams started using different tools for distinct needs and purposes. As a result, knowledge workers now spend 88% of their workweek communicating across various channels:
There’s a need for a unified solution, and we’ll explore this idea later in this article while considering a suitable solution.
Why Collaboration Tools Matter for Your Team
Between 2019 and 2021, the use of collaboration tools increased 44%:
However, the increasing adoption isn’t much when we compare it with the rise in employment opportunities from 2019 to 2024 — which, according to Statista, was roughly 66%.
Today, there are still barriers to effective collaboration. These are primarily centered on the lack of incentives and rewards. It pays off significantly when your team understands the importance of online collaboration tools and is rewarded for collaborative behavior.
To get your team on board, highlight the advantages of collaboration tools. These include:
Keeping people accountable
The communication features of collaboration tools inform everyone about a project’s progress, deadline (or due dates), and task ownership. This fosters a sense of accountability and ensures everyone is on the same page. Apps show assigned tasks on a dashboard, which can be filtered by project, due date, team, or individual team member.
These features encourage people to deliver on commitment while taking the initiative with thoughtful and strategic follow-through. These tools ensure people at all levels of the hierarchy are accountable for their obligations.
Collaboration tools help teams to:
- Set clear expectations
- Work with the team’s unique capabilities
- Report on the team’s performance
- Offer constructive feedback
This communication keeps everyone on the same page, responsible, and accountable for their commitments.
Streamlining communication
Collaboration platforms centralize communication, reducing email overload and missed messages.
Email overload isn’t an issue; it’s a symptom of a more significant issue: a lack of clarity on the decision-making process and ambiguous expectations from the team. It’s bound to flood the system with emails and meeting requests.
Collaboration tools streamline communication and keep everyone on the same page. They add real-time messaging and file-sharing capabilities that help teams stay connected and responsive, even when they’re working remotely. With real-time communication, users can efficiently exchange information and collaborate.
What’s more, messaging features offer search capabilities, making it easier for users to refer to previous communication.
Increasing efficiency
Collaboration tools automate workflows, task assignments, and document approvals, reducing manual effort and streamlining project execution. Think about it: On the customer service side, workflow management and automation can easily handle tickets and common questions by sending automated emails or creating to-do lists for relevant team members.
Then, the software can prioritize tickets based on the message’s tone while archiving them as soon as they’re resolved.
Such collaboration tool capabilities help you leave mindless tasks to the scripts, not only for customer service but for all departments that collaborate cross-functionally. They reduce clutter and let you focus on more critical tasks.
Improving customer communication
Whether you’re an established brand or a small start-up, customer communication is the most critical aspect of a business. Collaboration platforms with good communication capabilities help you stay on point when it comes to your clients.
You can easily share product updates, solicit feedback, and address customer inquiries as they come in. This delivers a memorable experience to your customers, and these experiences make a difference.
In the U.S., even if customers love a company or a product, 59% will walk away after several bad experiences, and 17% after just a single bad experience.
Types of Collaboration Tools
Below are different types of team collaboration tools you’ll find on the market.
Unified communication platforms
Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) integrates voice, video conferencing, instant messaging, and capabilities to share files into one platform. It simplifies your team’s communications and reduces your reliance on multiple platforms. These solutions perfectly accommodate remote work and the diverse communication preferences of remote teams.
The technology speeds up business operations while ensuring your team doesn’t need to hop between applications to keep their customers and teammates informed. UCaaS platforms like Nextiva are even available as mobile apps, providing flexibility and mobility when the team collaborates using the same tools, whether in the office or on the go.
Apart from unified communication, some tools, which we’ll look at in a moment, let the team build a collaborative culture.
Project management tools
When different people on a project collaborate as a group, they bring in new ideas, perspectives, and approaches to solve problems. Alex Melone and Andrei Marin, Co-Founders of CodeCrew, feel that “Collaboration allows the time to build upon one another, creating a result that’s better than the sum of its parts.”
Project management tools often include features like task creation, task assignment, progress tracking, and deadline management. These features help companies visualize a project’s progress and identify bottlenecks before they manifest. They also allow your team to ensure the project stays on track.
The software allows the team to:
- Stay on top of deliverables: Helps you review tasks that are pending, in progress, or done, letting owners match stakeholders’ expectations.
- Assign workload realistically: Allows you to assign workload based on the team’s available bandwidth, area of expertise, and various other factors. Moreover, you can assign work to a group that can drive results through collaboration without burning out.
- Delegate tasks: Allows you to ask for help by tagging people on the tasks’ comments with exactly where you need their support. It lets you collaborate and proactively seek support rather than waiting for the person to get on a call with you.
Source: Asana
Below are some popular project management software solutions to consider.
| Software | G2 rating (out of 5) | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
| Asana | 4.4 | The Starter plan starts at $10.99 per month |
| Trello | 4.4 | The Standard plan starts at $5 per month |
| Monday | 4.7 | The Basic plan starts at $9 per month |
Source: G2, Asana, Trello, Monday
File sharing and real-time collaboration software
Although async collaboration works for your teams most of the time, there are situations when you need to collaborate in real time — for example, when there’s a time-sensitive problem, puzzling challenge, or opportunity. This is where modern real-time collaboration can step in and relieve the pressure.
File-sharing and real-time collaboration software can securely store a file with cloud storage, allow real-time document editing, and provide version control. You can easily collaborate on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations, regardless of location.
Using this software ensures that you don’t lose context when transferring notes or dealing with any other issue. All stakeholders stay on the same page, making the team more connected as they work toward a resolution.
Did you know? Google enabled real-time collaboration through video portals to help its team work on tightly coupled tasks that require teams to brainstorm consistently.
Below are some popular file-sharing and real-time collaboration software tools to consider.
| Software | G2 rating (out of 5) | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
| Google Workspace (includes Google Docs, Google Drive, Gmail, Google Meet, Google Calendar, and other software) | 4.6 | Offers a free plan |
| Dropbox | 4.4 | The Plus plan starts at $9.99 per month |
| Microsoft 365 | 4.6 | Offers different pricing options for their products |
Source: G2, Google Workspace, Dropbox, Microsoft 365
Video conferencing tools
Modern video conferencing tools go beyond facilitating meetings, offering many features like:
- Whiteboarding: Helps participants share content and operate on it in real time with notes to maximize engagement.
- Integrations: Enable the video conferencing software to import third-party content from a different application, such as a presentation.
- Screen sharing: Allows participants to show a particular document or content on their screen as they’re talking about it.
What’s more, these tools facilitate breakout rooms and offer recording functionalities to make remote collaboration easier.
Below are some popular video conferencing software apps to consider.
| Software | G2 rating (out of 5) | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
| Zoom | 4.5 | The Pro plan starts at $12.49 per month |
| Microsoft Teams | 4.3 | The Essentials plan starts at $4 per month |
| Cisco Webex | 4.3 | The Webex Meet plan starts at $14.50 per month |
Source: G2, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Cisco Webex
Task management tools
Task management is a subset of project management: You’ll normally find it as a built-in feature. However, some tools specifically cater to task management use cases.
Task management software has features and capabilities like:
- Communication: To update the team or get feedback from them.
- Task dependencies: To join one task to another, making it clear that the first one needs to be completed to start another task.
- Status updates: To notify the team with updates on tasks or projects, keeping everyone in the loop.
Source: Todoist
Below are some popular task management software solutions to consider.
| Software | G2 rating (out of 5) | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
| Todoist | 4.4 | The Pro plan starts at $4 per month |
| Miro | 4.8 | The Starter plan starts at $8 per month |
| Notion | 4.7 | The Plus plan starts at $8 per month |
Source: G2, Todoist, Miro, Notion
Knowledge management tools
Knowledge management helps make information easily accessible without having to send emails, raise requests, or reach out to a specific person on your instant messaging application.
These tools make it easy to share information across departments when needed.
A company’s teams use knowledge management tools differently to keep their teams on the same page and facilitate easy knowledge sharing. IT professionals can use these tools to answer how-to and support questions when training or onboarding new employees; HR can use them to distribute company policies and pay schedules; and legal teams can use them to share and store approval processes, policies, and trademarks in one place.
Below are some popular knowledge management software tools to consider.
| Software | G2 rating (out of 5) | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
| Confluence | 4.1 | The Standard plan starts at $6.05 per month per user for a team of 100 users |
| ClickUp | 4.7 | The Unlimited plan starts at $7 per month |
| Microsoft Teams | 4.3 | The Essentials plan starts at $4 per month |
Source: G2, Confluence, ClickUp, Microsoft Teams
What to Look for in a Collaboration Tools Vendor
To find the most suitable collaboration tool for your organization, be sure to take the following steps.
Start with your needs
Identify your team size, workflows, budgets, and regulatory and security requirements. As they change, your requirements will change, too.
For example, small teams and large teams work very differently. Large teams often suffer from social loafing, which creates a perception of decreased value when many people share the same task.
You’ll need a tool that showcases who’s accountable while being transparent across the hierarchy. This would give people performing that task a sense of ownership, encouraging them to give their best shot.
In the same way, when your needs — like workflows and security — vary, the requirements from the team collaboration software will change.
Prioritize features
Focus on functionalities that address your core needs, avoiding unnecessary bells and whistles. Look for the must-have features; there is no room for negotiation when it comes to these.
Use these features as a filter to remove vendors that don’t offer them and are unsuitable for your use case.
For example, if you want to integrate all collaborative features into a single platform, UCaaS might be your priority. Or, if you simply want to highlight projects with an option to chat, a project management tool will be a more reasonable choice.
Evaluate vendors
Look for scalability, integrations with existing software, and an easy-to-use interface. When investing in tech, it’s best to check how easily the tool integrates with other business apps.
Collaboration software will not exist in a vacuum. It’s best to see if the tool increases agility or hinders your organization’s operations as you add more technology. For better scalability, it’s advisable to go with a cloud-based vendor.
Research and compare
Allow time for thorough research. Read reviews on websites like G2, Capterra, or TrustRadius, making sure the tool you’re considering checks all relevant boxes. If there’s a free trial available, create a pool of a few people who would try it first and take their feedback. Then, add more people to the pool, ensuring you collaborate on cross-functional projects.
Another way to research is to dive into case studies and see how teams like yours use the product and how they implement it in their business. This research will give you sufficient insights to measure the pain and gain you’ll have with vendors.
Match price to value
Compare pricing models to find the most cost-effective solution for your needs. In these calculations, consider both purchasing and maintenance costs. Instead of calculating ROI, see how much value a product can add to your business. For example, if a collaboration tool lets you bring a product faster to the market, recognizing a sizable revenue, it’s worth the investment.
When matching price to value, it’s best to seek opinions from industry peers who are already using the tool.
Source: G2
Increase Workplace Productivity With Nextiva
Even after being remotely connected to the whole world through the internet, knowledge workers often stay in their digital cocoon. They hop between emails, Slack, video calls, or other communication channels while staring blankly into their computer screens, figuring out when to do the “real work.”
Different types of collaboration and communication tools exist in a business. Sometimes, they might trick people into believing they’re working, but in reality, people are just switching interfaces with all good intentions of staying proactive.
To be on top of collaboration while still focusing on your work, you need an integrated communication solution that unifies different channels.
Enter Nextiva’s all-in-one communication platform.
Nextiva integrates all communication channels into one, keeping you safe from distractions while enabling seamless collaboration.
